


The Scarlet and the Gold

by Ad_Absurdum



Series: Imaginary Fragrances [11]
Category: Comme des Garçons - Puig (Perfumes), Imaginary Authors (Perfumes)
Genre: "Scarlet Game" by A3! (song), 1930s, Black by Comme des Garçons (perfume), Crime & Mystery, Gen, Imaginary Fragrance, Original work - Freeform, hopefully a bit of humour
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-22
Updated: 2019-11-22
Packaged: 2021-02-25 21:53:48
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,128
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21522496
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ad_Absurdum/pseuds/Ad_Absurdum
Summary: Notes:black pepper, leather, cedar wood, liquorice, vetiver, a distant note of river water and bloodWhen to wear:When you have a dead body and an unwanted 'associate' and you only know how to deal with the former. The latter? maybe it will be a start of a beautiful friendship, maybe not. Only time will tell. And this scent will perhaps remind you of the moment when it all started.
Series: Imaginary Fragrances [11]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1166144





	The Scarlet and the Gold

**Author's Note:**

> **A/N:** Most of these fragrance notes create an actual existing fragrance: _Black_ by Comme des Garçons. The only way I can describe this scent is "elegant and expensive". I know it's not very helpful, but you'll understand once you sample it.
> 
> **A/N 2:** I didn't really plan to write anything for this song, even though "Scarlet Game" has a very movie-like quality to it. You can practically see what happens, so I thought there's not much point in writing yet another story for the theme that's been told and re-told many times before. However, a day after I came to this conclusion, I realised this story needs to be written this way because someone very dear to me really wants to know these things. I actually wrote it back it October, but then things happened and so here we are, over a month later. Anyway, I hope you'll enjoy this, even if only a little bit. Though I guess I should apologise for the inevitable disappointment :D  
> Oh, Mr T. T. - thank you for the translations. Also, apologies for any trauma you might have incurred along the way :D

Henry stood in the train's corridor and stared out of the window at the passing landscapes, mourning his holidays. He only had two weeks of free time away from his work and even those were now cut short because some important toff had found a body drifting in a river and now the municipal police had to get on the case like a house on fire and find out what happened as soon as possible.

Henry briefly wondered why important toffs - like this one who, as Henry just remembered, was actually a high ranking politician - were strolling along Battersea river banks where the stiff had washed up. There was nothing interesting there, apart from the newly built power station, and Henry was half-inclined to start his suspects list with the man who found the body. And there would definitely be a suspects lists. Henry had just finished reading coroner's report which listed several knife wounds, obvious signs of struggle and no water in the lungs - a murder case if he ever saw one.

The victim was a woman: white, thirty to thirty-five, long blond hair, expensive clothes and no identifying documents on her whatsoever.

Maybe it was a robbery _and_ a murder? The report said that there were marks indicating that someone teared a thin chain off the victim's neck.

Was it really that valuable?

In Henry's opinion women were sometimes far too attached to their jewellery. Maybe if the woman hadn't struggled and had just given the chain to the robber, she would have saved her life.

Though on the other hand, maybe not. She still had a golden ring on her finger and she was still dead. The coroner had to really struggle to take it off - the body had swelled up, drifting in the river for so many hours.

So the robbery hypothesis was most likely useless.

Henry sighed. It was probably a crime of passion. The woman was a lover of some high-profile, married, rich fellow (the toff who found the body was still on top of the suspects list in Henry's opinion), they had a spat (or a bit more than that) and the man killed her, taking the things that had the potential to incriminate him: the chain (maybe there was a pendant of some significance on it?), the woman's purse...

It was still possible the police would find that hypothetical purse drifting in the river somewhere further down, but Henry didn't pin his hopes on that.

Yeah, it must've been something like that - nothing complicated but finding the murderer was going to be a nightmare. If they ever found him, that is. In the best case scenario they _would_ find him but the bastard would evade court or prison anyway because he would either pay his way out or would be so high-up on the political ladder that he would be untouchable.

Henry grimaced, thinking all of a sudden of Jack the Ripper. So yeah, that happened some fifty years ago and this woman probably wasn't a prostitute, but that case haunted Henry since childhood. Which was entirely his grandparents' fault. They lived in London at that time, they still did in fact, and every time Henry's parents left him in their care, they would tell their little grandson stories of the time Queen Victoria ruled the country. The stories featured Jack the Ripper rather prominently.

Henry was never scared (well, maybe a little when he was very very young), he was just indignant at the injustice, the senselessness of those deaths and the fact that the police was never able to satisfactorily solve the case. Not to Henry's satisfaction, anyway. This was probably why he was now a detective with the Municipal Police Force - he could blame it entirely on his grandparents. Or his inflated sense of justice. Or - if one bought into the whole past life mumbo-jumbo - on the fact that he was a policeman in Victorian England, was probably killed during the Ripper's case and got really pissed off because of that. He obviously wasn't of much use then, but maybe he could solve a bunch of other cases the second time around.

Needless to say, Henry didn't buy into this crackpot theory, but was forced to endure his grandfather telling him - albeit with a suspicious mirth in his eyes - that past lives were actually true and Henry certainly had something to either re-do or finish this time.

His grandparents were an odd couple. Very loving and caring, but odd.

Henry stared moodily at the trees moving past his field of vision while the train rushed towards London.

If he hadn't become a policeman, he could have been still in Brighton now. Maybe it wasn't the most glamorous place for holidays, but there was a sea and a beach and the weather was still nice in the early autumn and Henry could sit in a deckchair, read a newspaper in peace and enjoy the sights.

Henry gave into daydreaming, remembering all the pretty Brighton girls in knee-length skirts made to the latest fashion, their straw hats and pealing laughter when they strolled along the promenade. The sea breeze would sometimes graciously lift those skirts ever so slightly, granting Henry a glimpse of a shapely thigh or sometimes even a suspender.

Henry sighed dreamily. Stockings were an amazing invention in his opinion and it wouldn't be an overstatement to say he loved them dearly. There was just something about a woman wearing stockings... The thin material seemingly covering the nakedness but at the same time not doing a terribly good job of it. To tell the truth, Henry even preferred the slightly thicker fabric instead of the sheers. It was always a delightful surprise that while such stockings hid the skin completely from view, a simple act of sitting down could stretch the material over a knee and offer a hint of what lay underneath.

It never failed to make Henry's heart flutter.

Henry was distracted from his fantasies by a movement he caught from the corner of his eye. Another passenger stepped out of the compartment to stretch the legs. Henry discreetly observed the figure - it was a woman but with the way she was dressed, she could easily be mistaken for a man. She wore black trousers (Henry grimaced slightly. Why couldn't it be a skirt? even a long one?), white shirt, black waistcoat with a silver chain disappearing into one pocket, and black flat-heeled shoes. She looked like an undertaker.

Henry silently lamented the fact that some women took it into their heads to wear male clothing. What was the world coming to? Henry got it that it was the 30s already but in his opinion women should never give up their sweet soft looks.

He had to concede, though, that even the fanciest skirt wouldn't help this woman look sweet, and certainly not soft. She was tall - easily Henry's height - and flat as a board. That chest definitely wasn't built for any dress. The rolled-up sleeves of her shirt showed sinewy forearms and bony wrists - they looked fragile, but Henry was sure it was an illusion.  
The only really feminine thing about this woman was her hairstyle. It was something between a bob and a schoolboy's cut, but she had a short fringe over her high forehead. With her round face and slightly pointed chin, it wasn't exactly flattering, but at least no one would really take her for a man.

Henry only hoped she didn't wear a man's hat with that. Though it would probably do a great job of hiding her scowl. She would get permanent wrinkles between her eyebrows if she kept doing that.

Henry suddenly realised the woman was looking straight at him. Sort of like she really wanted to murder him. He automatically raised his hand to tip his hat, only to remember his hat was actually back in his compartment. He decided a strategic retreat was in order.

"Ma'am." He bowed slightly and went back to his seat.

Well... That went well.

Henry decided he'd better start reading the coroner's report again. After all, he had to be in the morgue first thing tomorrow morning anyway.

And there was also this chap coming from Manchester. G. Rosencrantz. A consultant. What did they need a consultant for? Wasn't London police good enough to solve this case?

Henry drummed his fingers on the papers. The fellow was probably called in because the toff who found the body, was dying (no pun intended) to win the next mayor elections and now had the perfect opportunity to show his potential voters how concerned he was and how very seriously he treated the safety of London people.

Politicians were like sharks, but sometimes they came in handy. Which didn't change the fact that Henry was still miffed at such an obvious lack of faith in the abilities of local police. He just hoped this _consultant_ wouldn't get underfoot. And that Henry's team wouldn't make too much fun of their names. They would make quite a pair, but Henry really hoped that they wouldn't end the same way their literary counterparts did.

* * *

The next day the first thing Henry actually did was going to the police station to see if anything new came up.

It didn't.

There was also no sign of this consultant chap and Henry hoped it would stay this way and that he would indeed keep away from getting under the police's collective feet, so to speak. Or better yet, would not show his face at all.

Around nine o'clock Henry finally arrived at the morgue. The consultant chap wasn't here either (Henry began to feel cautiously optimistic) but there was a coroner, constable Jenkins and a familiar-looking undertaker.

Henry blinked.

What was _she_ doing here? Christ, was she really an undertaker? Did the Chief Inspector cut her holidays short too?

"Thank you, Constable." The woman handed Jenkins some papers and the constable took his leave.

"Inspector," he greeted Henry as he walked past.

Henry nodded his greeting but his attention was decidedly elsewhere.

"Ma'am, I don't know what you are doing here, but at this point the investigation is still ongoing. We will arrange for the burial when we have all the information we need."

Also, they really needed to identify the body first, let the family know or something, and that seemed an uncomfortably faraway perspective. Henry tried not to grimace at the thought.

For a moment the woman looked surprised. Then she just looked like she wanted to ask Henry if he really was an idiot or just pretended to be one. To her credit, though, she no longer looked like she wanted to murder Henry right on the spot.

"Detective Inspector Henry Guildenstern, I presume," she spoke, entirely ignoring Henry's earlier words.

She took out a silver pocket watch and looked at it sceptically.

"I really hope you're coming here straight from your office. It's awfully late for a workday's start."

"I beg your pardon?" Henry bristled. Then he realised the woman knew who he was, but before he had a chance to question her on that, she spoke again.

"Gabrielle Rosencrantz."

_She_ was the consultant chap?!

"I was asked to help you on this case, but I don't really see the point."

Well, that makes two of us, Henry thought, still trying to overcome his shock at the turn of events.

"This is obviously a crime of passion and the killer was probably the victim's jealous husband. I'm sure you and your team are perfectly capable of finding the culprit."

She looked at Henry with a thinly veiled contempt and... a bit of a challenge?

Henry's opinion about the case was pretty much the same but, by Jove, it was the last thing he was going to admit now. This woman was just plain annoying.

"Yes, I'm sure my team will indeed find the culprit, but it certainly wouldn't do to rush to conclusions. It might look like a crime of passion, but we cannot exclude other possibilities, can we now?" Henry's tone oozed false amicability and his smile was turning from smarmy to evil.

The corner of the woman's lips twitched as if she was suppressing a smile of her own and there was definitely a glint of interest in her eyes.

"Well, I suppose so. But in that case, you'll probably need me," she said, turning to look at the body again.

What... was that? Henry stared at the back of the woman's head, nonplussed and somewhat off-balance.

"Please, go ahead. You probably wanted to verify with your own eyes what the coroner wrote in his report. Then we can go from there."

Well, that sounded... not bad. Pretty good even. And really, quite intriguing.


End file.
